Tired Kenyans march against 'dogged' police violence

Dozens in Kenya’s capital Nairobi held peaceful demonstrations on Monday against police brutality. Marching through Mathare slums, the demonstrators demanded justice for the victims of extrajudicial killings.

According to Kenya’s Independent Policing Oversight Authority, at least 15 people have been killed by the police since authorities imposed a coronavirus curfew in late March.

Rebecca, a protester underlined the necessity of the march: “It’s important to stand in solidarity with victims of police brutality both locally and globally and it’s atrocious. We can’t have a peaceful, prosperous, existence with a police state, period.”

“We are sick and tired of the police brutality, we want justice for everyone, regardless whether in Kenya or all over the world, LGBT, any body, black lives matter. We just want justice, there’s no need of violence, nobody needs to be killed nobody needs to be beaten,” another protester, Beatrice, stressed.

Kenya’s police force is often accused by rights groups of using excessive force and carrying out unlawful killings, especially in poor neighbourhoods. Before the coronavirus pandemic, Human Rights Watch documented eight cases of police killings in less than two months.